Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1887-11-21
Lincoln as an Orator.

I
himself on the methods by which he
acquired his power as an orator. A
clergyman who was among his audit
ors on one of these occasions, has re-
corded the following as among his
statements in a conversation he held
with him IN a railroad car:
s'Ah, that reminds me, he said,
of most extraordinary circum-
stance which occurred in New Haven
the other day. They told me that
the professor Of rhetoric i'm Yale coll
lege-a very learned man. isn't heE
Yes, sir, and a very fine critic, too.
well, ! suppose so; he ought 10 be-
at any rate-they told me that he
came to hear me, and took notes of
my speech, and gave a lecture on IL
to his class the next day; and not
satisfied with that. he followed me up
to Meriden the next evening, and
heard me again for the same purpose.
Now, if this is so. il is, To my mind
very extraordinary. ! have been
sufficiently astonished at my success
i'm the West. IL has been most uneN-
pected. But | had no thought of any
marked success at the East, and,
least Of all, that | should draw out
such concentrations from literary
and learned men "
That suggests, Mr. Lincoln, an in
quiry which has several times been
upon my lips during the conversation.
/ want very much to know how You
got this unusual power of quitting
things" 1t must have been n matter
of education. No man has il by ma
ture alone. What has your education
beenY
We'll, as To education, the news
papers are correct never went To
school more than six months in my
life But, as you say, this must be
product Of culture in some form. ]
have been putting the question you
ask me to myself while you have been
talking. / say this, that among my
earliest recollections, ] remember
how, when a mere child, used TO
get irritated when anybody talked 10
me in a way | could not understand.
] don't think ! ever got angry at
anything else in my life. But that
always disturbed my temper, and has
ever since. ] can remember going 10
my little bedroom, after hearing the
neighbors talk Of an evening with my
father, and spendingno small part of
the night walking up and down, and
trying to make out what was the eX-
act meaning of some of their, to me,
dark sayings. ] could not sleep,
though ! often tried to, when ] got
on to such a hunt after an idea, until
j had caught it and when thought
/ had got it, ] was not satisfied until
l had repeated it over and over, until
had put it in language plain enough,
as thought. for any boy ! knew to
comprehend. This was kind of
passion with me, and il has stuck by
me, for ] am never easy now, when ]
am handling a thought, till ! have
bounded it north and bounded il
south, ,and bounded it east and bound
ed it west. Perhaps that accounts
for the characteristics you have OBJ
served in my speeches, though ] new
er put the two things together be-
fore
Files were in use among the arti-
sans as early as 1898 b. c.
Leaden pipes for the conveyance
of water were brought into use in
1896.
The earliest known letter is that
sent to Joab by David, by the hand
of Uriah, about 1885 B. c.
At the destruction Of Jerusalem
1, 100, 900 Jews are said 10 have been
put to the sword A. -. 20.
The nobility Of England date their
creation from lOG6, when William
Fitz-Osborne is said 10 have been
made Earl of Hereford by William l..
The first laws Of navigation origin
ated with the Rhodians, 9lG B. {.
Otto Won Guericke constructed the
first electrical machine, a globe Of
sulphur, about l647. Humphrey
Davy produced electric light with
carbon points in 1902.
Poppea, the wife Of Nero, is said
to have invented masks to guard her
complexion from the sun but the
atrical masks were Ia use among the
Greeks and Romans.
The great London fire in 1866 de-
stroyed eighty-nine churches (includ-
ing st Paul's), many public build
ings and 200 houses, and made .
homeless 100000 people.
In the west at the close Of the
year the markets will probably show
aggregate receipts OF 5000, 900 head .
of cattle. OF these at least ,O00,- I
600 head should have gone over
another year, bat the drought, scar
city Of corn aud the hardness of .
money are conspiring 10 force them
on the market.
The honey crop this season will boz .
one Of the poorest Tor years. ln .
almost every district throughout the .
country the honey crop is poor .
New York aud eastern Pennsylvania
have always been fair producing
states, bat this year their crop h